TECHNIQUE
STRENGTH TRAINING
TEN-MINUTE HOME PROGRAMME This daily workout is designed for beginners. It can be done at home with no equipment and will help to strengthen your body for a bet er swim.
PRESS UPS
Place your hands shoulder-width apart directly beneath your shoulders. Keep your head up and make sure your chest touches the fl oor each time. Muscles worked: chest, triceps, shoulders, core. Variations: To make it easier, you can put your knees on the fl oor. Sets and repetitions: 2x15, with 30s rest. Progression: Perform on one leg. Benefi t: Targets some of the main muscles used in swimming.
TRICEP DIPS
Place the palm of your hands behind you on a chair and keep your arms close. Make sure your arms are fully extended and then lower your body until your bum is near to the fl oor. Muscles worked: Triceps. Variations: Make it slightly easier by bending knees to 90˚. Sets and repetitions: 2x15, with 30s rest. Progression: Use two chairs – one for palms, the other for your legs. Benefi t: This exercise will give you a powerful upsweep, which is the fi nal push you do before the recovery phase of crawl.
RUSSIAN TWIST
Lie with your knees bent at 90˚. Have both your arms on the fl oor to make your body into a cross shape. Rotate your legs from side to side in a controlled manner, ensuring your opposite shoulder remains on the fl oor. Muscles worked: obliques (side of abdominals). Variations: Bend your knees to less than 90˚ for less of a muscle pull.
Sets and repetitions: 2x20 (10 each side), with a 30s rest. Progression: Instead of bending your knees, keep your leg straight. Benefi t: This exercise will condition the core and improve your shoulder and hip roll.
When swimming, an estimated 70 percent of speed comes from good technique, while the other 30 comes from increased fi tness. Your technique helps speed in two ways: stroke length and stroke rate. Both of these variables can be improved by incorporating strength training into your programme. Also, strength training has been shown to increase time to exhaustion, which should help you maintain your form, and swim with more intensity for longer.
INJURY PREVENTION The fi rst question of strength training is what type you should do: land or swim-specifi c training. The lat er includes using drag pants, swimming parachutes, paddles and resisted and assisted sprint training, and this is a functional method that will easily transfer to an improved swimming performance (look out for a feature
in a future issue of H2Open). However, land training has one big advantage: it can address muscle imbalances that lead to injuries in the shoulder. Think of your body as a building structure. You must have a solid
foundation to build on or the building will eventually fall down. Training with an injury-prone body is the equivalent of erecting a building on a dodgy foundation – a weak shoulder joint will lead to niggling pains or, even worse, injuries over a period of time. We all have muscle imbalances, caused by the repetitive
movements of the arm during swimming. What happens with repetitive injuries or muscle imbalances around the shoulder is that the muscles that rotate the arms inwardly become strong and short, while the muscles that rotate the arms in the opposite direction become weak and long. These opposing muscles work in pairs and need to have balance to maintain optimal shoulder health. Injuries occur when one set of muscles becomes stronger than its opposing muscles. Strength training of the weaker muscles can address these muscle imbalances to build a strong foundation. These two exercise programmes can be done at home, with minimal equipment. By using your own weight, or a resistance band, you will not only insure your body against injuries, but you will improve the strength of your muscles. It probably won’t help you beat the PBs of the Korean National Swimming Team, but it should bring you that bit closer to the front of the pack. ○
Land training can help to protect you against injury
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